doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Lefever thumb push action

Wow - cool gun. Any more pics? I would love to see them.

OWD

Great find. I'd love to find one along with a Parker 20 lifter.

Here are a couple more. The stock is poorly done, but I love the gracefully sculpted fences, concave rib, and clam shell engraved forend on this gun. It shoots well too. I'm hoping it ends up as my main early season upland gun when I'm done re-working the stock:

Mark;
Don't want to sound too picky, but that is the push button forend fastener. The Clamshell has a lever & works on the principal of the Deeley, though it is shaped differently on a Lefever.

My 10 gauge pivot opener is SN'd @10,115. It has engraving very similar to yours, also has the push button forend release. It has 32" Damascus barrels & weighs in at a full 10 lbs. Does your gun have a pistol grip & if so does its tang run all the way down to the grip cap?

Unfortunately, someone had "Blued" my gun, both barrels & frame prior to me acquiring it. I kept thinking I would properly re-finish it but never got to it. Incidentally, its chambers measure 3" long.

Miller, thanks for the correction. You are right of course. I was referring to the engraved scallop shell design of the push button. I've never seen that before on a Lefever, but this is by far the earliest one I've owned. My other two are 1898 and 1904 respectively. This gun does have a poorly done pistol grip, and I doubt it is the original trigger guard. I'll be converting it to a long tang straight grip, since originality has flown out the window with this gun.

Your 10ga sounds massive. Is it fun to shoot a 10lb gun? I don't think I've shot one more than 7.5lbs before. I've thought about getting a 10 at some point just for ducks and geese, but feeding them is the issue. Speaking of long chambers, my 1904 GE 12 (below, bottom pic ) has factory 2 7/8 chambers. Go figure.

Lefever made what people wanted. I have an early ten hammer gun that has 3" chambers. A 12 thumb push has 2 7/8" chambers. We think of extra long shells for heavier shot loads but in those days the extra room was used for extra, better wadding.

On your new gun treat that stock like a semi inlet blank. One thing I truly like about Lefevers is that the stock are so trim and the lines are so beautiful. That chunk of walnut needs to be timed down from a Saint Bernard to a greyhound.

Have a Lefever C thumb push s/n 93XX from 1885, Mark. It's a 10 gauge 2-barrel set, both heavy. Also has the screw at the same place behind the dolls head.

Keith Kearcher did a butt stock transplant brilliantly and I regularly use the gun for geese. Do not know if Keith's son, now running the business, can do that sort of work.

Regards, Tim

Mark Larson,

6,683 is definitely an interesting serial number, both for the cocking type, and the name on the plates. That era was typified by sidecockers, and most of them are "D.M. Lefever," with a handful of examples which say LAC but were clearly produced out of sequence.

Yours being both LAC and a rod cocker is pretty unique. And a straight grip, to boot!

Nice find.

- NDG

That is true, except I doubt if this one started out with an original straight grip stock. Judging by the shape of the sideplates, it seems very possible that this was a prototype gun where Dan Lefever utilized a frame forging and sideplates left-over from his Barber and Lefever partnership. This could well be one of the first rod cockers, and there is a good chance it was worked on by Dan himself. Nice find indeed, and something to think about going forward with any restoration work.

Personally, I think the term "out of sequence" is often a misnomer with Lefevers. We really have no idea what the normal practice was for stamping a frame with a serial number. If a prototype frame was held back for construction, or being used by one of the Lefever family or an employee for testing and evaluation, then it probably wasn't really out of sequence at all. The number of subtle and not so subtle variations over the years suggest this was a fairly common occurrence. These myriad changes often make things challenging when you are attempting to find original spare parts for a Lefever. This constant tinkering with the design carried over into the later crossbolt Lefevers as well.

The term is certainly over-used and misused with the insanely large number of guns that are attributed to post-1916 assembly by Ithaca.

Several years ago, Bob Noble had 6 Thumb Push Opener guns in 16 ga. on his serial number list. He might be interested in hearing about this one.

Lefever was in partnership with Barber in 1874-1876 & then with John Nichols in 1876-1879. "Uncle" Dan's patent for the side-cocker was #229,4259 issued June 29, 1880, or after he had parted ways with Nichols.

The hypothesis of it being a prototype & an extremely early Cocking Rod gun is for certain a great possibility, but I would think more likely made on a Nichols & Lefever frame than an L Barber one.

Most of the L Barber guns were in the 5K serial number range with the Nichols & Lefever guns being in the 6K range.

Whatever it is for sure a gun to be treasured.